New Ride for 9 YO Son

So my son has been riding with me since he was one year old. It started in a Burley, then progressed to a tricycle, a 16" Specialized, the back half of an Ibis Tandem, a 20" Fisher Single speed and about a year and a half ago, a 24" Specialized. In the last year, he has also started riding BMX for fun which has improved his skills tremendously. He is now 4'8" and keeping up with me both on climbs and descents.

He has been asking about a full suspension bike for more than a year and I have been waiting until he got large enough and his skills good enough. He is ready to ride Downieville and wants to ride more of Tahoe so I decided now it the time. I spent two months looking for a good used bike and found nothing. Everything was trashed or way overpriced. I finally started looking for deals on new bikes to get one for his Birthday and Hanukkah (which overlapped this year). Helping the budget along were my sister who is also a rider ($500) and grandparents ($250).

I finally found a bike he liked, a Santa Cruz Nickel on closeout from Competitive Cyclist for $1999 in XS. It was ordered on December 1, then delayed for the fork, then delayed again because the Easton XC70 wheels were out of stock. Not wanting to wait further I spoke to Competitive Cyclist who gave me an incredible discount upgrading to Mavic Crossmax ST wheels. Today the bike showed up and I was able to assemble it. I am impressed, it is 27.5 pounds assembled with the flat pedals. Not bad for 5" travel bike.

Now I just have to wait until next Saturday when he is here. (He spends half the time with his Mom.) Here are some picts of him with his 24" Specialized in Tahoe and his new bike waiting for him.

Great looking bike! I just upgraded my son's bike to a 2009 Jamis Dakar XCR Expert size 13". The frame was new from Jenson. I left the 24" wheels from his Sette Reken 14" that I built for his 8th birthday 1.5 years ago. Next summer I hope to put 26" wheels on. Here is the end result. He just rode it Saturday for the first time. In his words... I love this bike!

Great looking bike! I just upgraded my son's bike to a 2009 Jamis Dakar XCR Expert size 13". The frame was new from Jenson. I left the 24" wheels from his Sette Reken 14" that I built for his 8th birthday 1.5 years ago. Next summer I hope to put 26" wheels on. Here is the end result. He just rode it Saturday for the first time. In his words... I love this bike!

Now I know where that frame went. I was eyeballing an Intense VVP in XS on Ebay that finally sold and then looking at the Jamis on Jenson. I finally decided I would get the Jamis and it was gone. Almost ended up with a Rocky Mountain 50 bike from Jenson, but the Santa Cruz had better components and figured I would be able to get at least 5-6 years out of them.

My 9 year old son has been begging for a suspension bike. My younger sister has been riding a Trek EX7 small (too small for her) and is selling. I'm buying it for him. Sure, it's a women's model but it doesn't look all that girly. I think he'll like it once he grows a bit, he's a little small for it right now but in a year...

My 9 year old son has been begging for a suspension bike. My younger sister has been riding a Trek EX7 small (too small for her) and is selling. I'm buying it for him. Sure, it's a women's model but it doesn't look all that girly. I think he'll like it once he grows a bit, he's a little small for it right now but in a year...

I looked at a lot of "women's" bikes as they are the easiest to find in xs. My plan was to just not tell him.

I was keeping an eye on them at Jenson, when they started to go I figured I would order it. I am really happy with the XCR. I ride an older Jamis XLT and it has been great. This year he also gets a Specialized Gromhit for Christmas so we can go to Mountain Creek bike park here in NJ. I've been sitting on that for over 2 years and hoping he would still enjoy riding. I'll post that after I give it to him!

Wow, that's impressive man in so many ways, great that your kid loves to ride, that he can hand you your lungs on a platter on the climbs and buzz your rear wheel on the descents, and great that you've encouraged and rewarded his efforts with such a great bike. Your son is going to be absolutely over the moon when he sees that bike, and if you can get him off it for bed without some serious effort I'll be surprised.

Make sure you post up those smiling faces when they get their new bikes for Christmas! My kids got to have xmas yesterday because we are leaving this morning for vacation. My son was absolutely stunned, totally clueless that he was getting a new bike. It's pouring buckets here but we snuck out for a quick ride. Climbed a hill, crossed a creek and hit a few jumps. All I heard was "I love this bike".

I'll post up pictures on Christmas day.... but I purchased my son (9 years old), a 2013 Trek 3700 Disc in size Small (which I believe was a 13" frame) on 26" wheels.

He's at that stage where he'll grow out of a 24" bike ridiculously fast, and a "full size" 26" bike seemed too big. SOOOOOOO.... I was able to score this model for $100 off from the bike shop. I hope he fits. He's 56" tall.

Make sure you post up those smiling faces when they get their new bikes for Christmas! My kids got to have xmas yesterday because we are leaving this morning for vacation. My son was absolutely stunned, totally clueless that he was getting a new bike. It's pouring buckets here but we snuck out for a quick ride. Climbed a hill, crossed a creek and hit a few jumps. All I heard was "I love this bike".

Well he loves the new bike. Tomorrow we will go for a real ride so he can push it a bit. One minor issue; it shipped with the wrong fork. It was supposed to have a 140mm and came with a 120mm. I'm waiting to hear back from competitive cyclist.

Uh, I'd warn your kid about the going over stuff with eyes closed, not a great idea. If he's scared enough to go over something to make him close his eyes, maybe he should give it a miss. Now you may just have caught him mid blink, but I'd find that hard to believe.

Originally Posted by CDMC

I stopped to take pictures, but have been slammed with work so didn't get back to posting them. Not the best quality, but here are a few.

Oh, OK, well then that's better I just mentioned it as I've ridden with a couple people who actually just close their eyes in a situation where they're scared and not sure Only time I've closed my eyes is when I knew it was going bad when I couldn't unclip on a side mountain trail and was going over sideways somersault style, closed my eyes to try and help protect them in case, as there was absolutely nothing else I could do but hold onto the bars and hope for not too bad

Originally Posted by CDMC

He is actually looking down. I just had this the other day taking pictures of him opening presents. At first I thought he was blinking.